Traveling speed, walk, caravan, horse in ancient and middle ages?

I would like to know distances that is possible to cover in various situations. I know speed of walk, horses in different gait but I want to know actual distance/time cover including necessary resting etc. for these situations in ancient or middle age times:

1. how far can a caravan go per day
2. how far can mid speed horseman or small pack of riders go per day
3. how far can super speed mailman go per day (delivering super important message and maybe changing horses).

Consider it being on easy not much changing terrain on road, all healthy individuals, usual weight. Dont need specific answers so dont ask specific questions just shoot something at me.. I need something to grasp on.. you may be wrong some miles/kilometers does not matter just shoot some answers what you think, google is not much helpful so far… I have no idea my own.. maybe caravan could be something around 25/30 km day? Others I have no idea.

2 Comments

Gerald Cline
on 29/12/2013 at 11:41

An average would be about three miles an hour, with a ten minute rest every hour or so. Travel would normally be during daylight hours. A larger group, like a caravan or army, would need more time to get started, and more time to stop and set up camp for the night, taking up some of the daylight used to travel. Weather and terrain would play major factors. In good weather and over good terrain about ten to fifteen miles a day would be average.

Post riders were a different matter. Relays were set up along roads to expedite speed. A rider would reach the relay station, and probably take five minutes or less to change horse, then be off again. Instead of walking the horses, they would canter at probably more like six to eight miles an hour with the relays close enough together that the horse would not have to stop and rest between relay stations. Messages could travel fifty or sixty miles a day, and night would not necessarily stop the relay riders like it would a caravan or group of pilgrims (or whatever).

A real-world example, Harold Godwinson marched his House Curls (averaging) about 27 miles a day from the North where they had fought the Battle of Stamford Bridge to face William of Normandy at Hastings. This was a forced march, and they did about twice the distance a day that would be "normal."

La meccanica dell'arancia
on 29/12/2013 at 11:41

1. only a few miles if most by the day
2. a little farther
3. around a hundred miles